And SPD is his Game!

Heheh ok im going to kiss a little ass here so be warned.

i picked up this little a ditty a few days ago and my first impressions were awesome enough as it is.

what is it you ask?

its an RPG

wtf?

a Sonic RPG?

yes! Arr Pee Gee!

well its developed by BioWare. so that in itself should tell you quite a bit about it.

if that DOESNT, BioWare are the folks that brought us such awesomely awesome games as Mass Effect, Jade Empire, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 1&2, Baldur's Gate, Never Winter Nights, and lots of others.

first off the list of playable characters is pretty awesome. you can have 10 playable characters to choose from, from Sonic and Tails at first to any of the following through the course of the game: Knuckles, Amy Rose, Big the Cat, Shadow the Hedgehog, Rogue the Bat, Dr. Eggman/Robotnik (yeah weird huh?), Cream the Rabbit, E-123 Omega, and the new character Shade the Echidna. the game even features cameos by Vector the Crocodile and G.U.N. 

and of course the game takes full advantage of the DS's touch screen technology by using the stylus to navigate through game menus, combat menus, activate special attacks called POW moves and move on the map.

the game even goes so far to incorporate each of Team Sonic's special abilities. i refer to these as move abilities because accessing certain parts of the map require certain move abilities. Sonic's speed allows him to use ramps and loop-the-loops and move quickly through pipes and such. Tails, Cream, Rogue and even Knuckles to an extent can fly (or in Knuckles' case, glide). of course Tails will get the ability to travel very far while Knuckles (i think) is stuck with only Fly level 1. other move abilities are Warp, Invulnerable, Climb, and Smash. all will be needed at one point or another to access 100% of the map and almost always for quests.

its got a great story in my opinion, dealing with (without giving anything really away) a new menace threatening to steal the Master Emerald. even Dr. Robotnik/Eggman and Shadow are forced to play for Team Sonic to get rid of this new evil!

and of course as an RPG it does revolve around battle sequences and gaining EXP.  when you do level you are allowed to put an extra point into their stats to further customize the character, and you are able to spend 5 points to puchase POW abilities. some of these abilities even involve other characters (so plan whos in your party well!) to do massive damage and even inflict special status effects!

and of course Sonic would be powerless without his Rings! only this time rings are used as currency, buy equipment, items, or save yourself from a gameover by paying with rings. some rings will even ressurect your characters mid battle (like a standard resurection item), other items include things to temporarily boost stats, HP items, POW points items, and items to sure status effects. and not be left out Chao are in this game as well, only this time they can be assigned to specific characters to enhance that characters abilties, stats, you name it. there are 40 different Chao in the game each with a different effect and will hatch and grow automatically once youve found the Chao eggs in each landscape.

all of that makes this game awesome, but there are a couple snags that keep it from being totally awesome.

first off is the signiture BioWare dialog. although its great in other games by these guys, the dialog choices usually serve to determine your characters alignment or personality... they dont in this game. dialog choices are just for fun or for advancing conversation more quickly, or finding out more information at times.

the only other gripe i have is that the game is a bit too easy. i didnt have a hard time until i did a quest several levels early, and even then i was able to do it in a try or two. as long as you are remotely close to the level you are supposed to be while doing missions or quests you'll never really be in danger. i am of course only about 75% of the way into the game so im hoping it gets "pleasently challenging" sometime soon.

all in all im pretty pleased with the game and its kept me pretty involved since i got it. its defintaly worth a play if you like any 2 of the following: RPGs, Sonic the Hedgehog, DS games, breathing, women.